London Fashion Week finds a new balance between creativity and commerciality

There was something that felt largely grown-up at the recently concluded Spring-Summer 27 edition of London Fashion Week.  This is the third season under the fully formed executive vision of British Fashion Council CEO Laura Weir, who took over operations in April 2025. And given that Kering-operated McQueen returned home under the creative direction of Sean McGirr, after almost two decades of staging runways in Paris, one can safely say that Weir and her team are off to a remarkably good start.

But besides getting big names like McQueen back on the schedule, and creating a sustained sense of hype globally around Christopher Kane’s debut for Mulberry, there was also a consistent sense of commerciality and wearability in the collections showcased this season: words sparingly used for London, which has always bet big on daring, provocative creatives. Amidst loads of fringes, denims, the centrality of craft and embellishments, popping colours, body-conscious, sensual, revealing drapes and tailoring, we saw Talia Byre embrace New Romanticism with Edwardian jackets and reworked tailcoats over ruffled shirts and corsets; LVMH finalist Petra Fagerström play with conservative shapes through ample restructuring and splicing; Oscar Ouyang present bloomer shorts with cropped jackets and sequinned knits; and Aaron Esh present an array of finely tailored, sleek propositions in bursts of neon.

But while there was loads of quotidian beauty to admire among the 47 catwalks and 23 presentations this season, one must remember that wearability and commerciality do not necessarily translate into good fashion. And while the provenance of cities like London has always lain in darkly sensuous, ridiculously punkish provocations, there are second thoughts to be had when space gets afforded to fast fashion giants like Marks & Spencer (which celebrated its 100th anniversary with a runway show) and H&M (which returned to the city for the second year running) to platform their creations as high-fashion offerings. And while one ponders these questions, here are some shows that stayed with me this season.

Maximilian Raynor 

For his Spring-Summer collection, Maximilian Raynor took his audience to the countryside of Derbyshire where two rival families, the Gingers and the Elders (modelled on the Montagues and Capulets from Shakespeare’s Romeo & Juliet), fought out an Ascot-meets-Wimbledon sporting event. There were sensual, deliberately queer-coded boys in shorts, plaid jackets, and sleeveless vests; in Raynor’s world they could be players in the game, or assistant coaches, even managers of the warring teams. The women appeared in a carefully edited selection of evening-wear made from handmade textiles, ribbons (which Raynor admitted backstage to being a favourite material of his) and loads of fringes. With bursts of colour­ —from fuchsia pink to neon greens—a selection of trailing bags, sleek knee-length boots, smartly layered menswear, and corsets that seemed to free more than they appeared to restrict, Raynor’s collection was a joyous study of British preppiness, with just that edge of countryside roughness that one has come to expect from his subversive storytelling. 

H&M 

Taking place in Kensington’s Olympia, with a 40 metre runway, and a show creatively directed by Nick Knight and produced by SHOW Studio, this was the label’s second year in a row staging a runway as part of London Fashion Week. Opening with a ballet performance by Brazilian dancer Ingrid Silva, the collection featured a new vision for H&M’s Atelier Line by Ana Hernandez alongside the brand’s Autumn 26 collection by Ann-Sofie Johansson. There were Victorian ruffles, Tudor collars, and Edwardian jackets; sharply tailored menswear reminiscent of 90s minimalism; and corsets with pattern-cut denims and mini skirts resembling stacked belts—more than once evoking ideas from Daniel Roseberry’s prêt propositions at Schiaparelli. As models from Alex Consani and Paloma Elsesser to Lila Moss and Kristen McMenamy walked the ramp, a larger question loomed in the air: What happens when fast fashion brands, as part of a larger rebranding strategy, begin taking space in fashion weeks like London, whose provenance has forever included the upholding and platforming of independent, emerging talent?

Fashion East 

Since its establishment in 2000 by Lulu Kennedy and Old Truman Brewery, Fashion East has been one of the frontline forces incubating creative talent for the fashion industry in London. Some of the biggest designers today—from Jonathan Anderson and Kim Jones to Simone Rocha and Grace Wales Bonner— began their journeys through this widely coveted talent incubator. This season, three designers brought their collections to life at a cavernous hall in South London. Inspired by the glamour of busy women in the streets of Hong Kong in the 80s, designer MeMe’s collection showcased simple raincoat patterns cut in netting twist and swaying skirts, with organza digits and printed tulle layered on denim. The reverential Galliano references were endearing to witness, as were the repeated (and forever chic) references to smoking. For his latest runway outing, Jacek Gleba proposed a queer, sensuous, and oftentimes seditious world of clothing with the power to transport anyone to a beach resort in the South of France. There were halter-neck tops, sequinned pants, and sleeveless shirts, each creating the illusory beauty of a lover’s gaze. And finally, for his sophomore outing for Goyagoma, designer Traiceline Pratt went back to the everyday materialities of his growing up years in the Bahamas. There were bursts of colour in sensuously cut and draped evening wear, a touch of whimsy in mechanic uniforms reimagined with trench details, and sequinned, woven beauty in the collars of utilitarian overshirts: definitely one of the most fully realised collections I have seen this season.

Erdem

 

Following the beautifully irreverent pastiche of his 20th anniversary collection earlier this year, designer Erdem Moraliog˘lu turned his attention to Texas-born Parisian aerialist Vander Clyde Broadway, more popularly known as Barbette, who rose to fame in the 1920s for their seductive, androgynous performances in Moulin Rouge. A muse to surrealists like Jean Cocteau and Man Ray, Barbette’s liminal androgyny translated onto the runway through a series of dual propositions: a tuxedo jacket with a fringed, scarf lapel, first cropped and paired with embellished micro shorts, and then spliced and paired with a satin bra and micro shorts.

This tension further developed and expanded over the course of the collection as cropped wool sweaters with scallop hems appeared over embellished tulle dresses. Erdem’s carefully honed signatures from over two decades were also peppered throughout: exploded opera coats in satin that reveal more than they conceal, evening dresses in lace, and the house’s signature shredded skirts imitating impressionist art in motion. Taking place in North London’s Roundhouse—an unusual choice for the designer who usually hosts his runways inside museums or galleries— the collection was easily one of Moraliog˘lu’s best in years; a restrained, sometimes dark, meditation on queer androgyny through a design-forward lens, steeped in the best of British craftsmanship.

Mulberry by Christopher Kane 

One of the hotly anticipated debuts of this season, Christopher Kane’s vision for the British leather goods brand was as precise as it was underwhelming in parts. At a time when designers are increasingly fronting hand-embellishments in their collections, replacing the post-Covid-era 90s minimalism revival with a softer, more draping-focused approach to clothing, Kane took a cue from the flap of Mulberry’s signature Bayswater bag, building a collection of laser-cut leather patterns in sleek silhouettes. The flap pattern, discernible from a distance, appeared everywhere: from bodies, to necklines, to hemlines.

Kane is one of British fashion’s darling wunderkids whose sartorial vision has always included design-led, fashion-forward choices. His decision to center and replicate a recognisable design code was hence not much of a surprise; instead it expressed confidence and a slow, but steady start for a designer only beginning to explore the archival possibilities of a heritage brand predominantly known for its leather goods. There were disruptions to the otherwise uniformly neutral colour palette, of course: a parka in a shockingly bright shade of orange; and a printed chiffon tea dress brought much-needed softness to the otherwise surgical precision of the collection. Only time will tell, however, the full breadth of Kane’s vision for the brand, who his Mulberry woman truly is, and whether his trademark eccentricities are enough to revive the heritage brand.

McQueen 

McQueen’s London homecoming, after close to two decades of presenting as part of the official schedule of Paris Fashion Week, was supposed to be a glorious, grand affair. Instead, creative director Sean McGirr’s spring-summer collection for the brand was an unusually divisive, patchily incoherent, chameleon beast that made one reflect on their own expectations from a brand with such a loaded legacy. There is no doubt about McGirr’s capabilities as a designer; his collection largely included tailored menswear with folded lapels and bodices created in collaboration with Savile Row Huntsman, diaphanous evening dresses with silver leaves, and silk ensembles with metal neckpieces by Shaun Leane that added a much-needed layer of kink to the clothes.

Backstage, McGirr explained being inspired by a painting by Piero della Francesca at the National Gallery, whose religious iconicism and romance he wanted to fuse with the darker beauty of London’s rave scene. But despite the well-intended merits of McGirr’s creative vision, something felt amiss about it when weighed against the brand’s current corporate reality, sinking sales and a larger legacy under founder Lee McQueen—whose sharp, volatile, brutal design sensibilities always resulted in provocative runways that never felt like a comment on the current plight of our times. What then does one do with a brand like McQueen in today’s day and age? Is it enough to assess the house on the merits of its current creative leadership? Or is it necessary to continue expecting it to rise to the stature of its hallowed provenance in a bid to take its legacy forward?

Lovebirds Studio 

Cheekily named India: IYKYK, Lovebirds Studios’ debut London collection took inspiration from the rich visual and cultural vocabulary of a country in the 70s and 80s, at a time when the internet was yet to arrive, and imagination could run wild. Inspired by the washed-out blues and pale pinks of our hand-painted adverts and billboards, the collection unfolded in a series of finely tailored, printed, and hand-embroidered propositions. It opened with a model in a simple silk bra and embroidered, sheer petticoat-like skirt. Her hair, done in the style of the high-volume 60s bouffant, was an ode to the designer’s memories of watching their mother get ready before any event—the exact moment prior to her putting on a sari. The landscape backdrops of our photo studios appeared in the form of skirts, shirts, and dresses. Elsewhere, the ‘adarsh balak’ (ideal child) comic strips which outlined the expectations of an ideal boy from middle-class households, along with illustrations from human anatomy charts in Hindi, became the deconstructed graphic base for evening wear, chicly held together by a leather belt. Imitating the mundane beauty of our everyday urban lives from yore, models walked in kitten heels inspired by the country’s famous Bata chappals, neatly tied together with a black band to ward off the evil eye. The staggered use of chintz, in the form of trailing coats, cocoon skirts, and fringed skirts, also served as a clever nod to the subcontinent’s ancient history of textile trading. Peppered with sublime menswear pieces and never shying away from the designer duo’s trademark architectural whimsies, India: IYKYK was a truly realised, culturally loaded debut that carried with it the sharpest of design sensibilities, rooted in the most intelligent of references.

Burberry 

Daniel Lee’s Burberry Summer 2027 collection was a soulful, joyous ‘return to the basis of things’. Inspired by British textile artist Celia Birtwell, whose distinctive prints helped define the look of the 1960s and 1970s, the collection unfolded at London’s Chelsea College of Arts, marking the start of a series of ongoing collaborations between the House and institution. A white-box space lined with wooden benches referencing the iconic Burberry Check set the scene for a collection rooted in British heritage and craft but reframed with a youthful, spontaneous energy. With Jonathan Bailey, Gemma Chan, Joe Locke, Fiona Shaw and Indian model Mahieka Sharma among the front- row guests, Lee presented a bright summer palette of yellow, orange, blue, and pastel pink. The Burberry Check evolved into gingham and stripes before being disrupted by expressive faces and floral motifs.

Sequinned skirts appeared alongside exquisite sheer chiffon trenches embroidered with quintessential summer picnic details, from blueberries and strawberries to clusters of lavender sprigs. Relaxed silhouettes, loose tailoring, and transparent fabrics brought an effortless sense of movement to the collection, signalling a fresh, youth-focused direction for Burberry under Lee. In the past year, the house, after many seasons, reported a fresh uptick in sales, with Lee’s dark and sensual fall-winter collection presented in February indicating a renewed interest in revisiting house archives. That same lens of nostalgia permeated the collection this season, which retained its predecessor’s sheer sensual sensibilities while offering a visual palette rooted in bonhomie. It is a solid, amply bold direction being undertaken by Lee to earnestly tap into the next generation of Burberry buyers, and one that I am here to watch with bated breath. 

This article originally appeared in Harper's Bazaar India's October 2026 print issue.

Artwork by Trushieta Naringrekar; Images: Courtesy the brands and Getty Images

Also read: Ferragamo unveils its first curated Diwali Edit, created exclusively for India

Also read: The fashion labels defining the style conversation right now